China’s Wuhan Iron and Steel to cut around 50,000 jobs

An employee stands next to coils of steel inside a factory in Dalian, Liaoning province, October 18, 2013. China's economy grew at its quickest pace this year between July and September, underpinned by investment. REUTERS/China Daily (CHINA - Tags: BUSINESS) CHINA OUT. NO COMMERCIAL OR EDITORIAL SALES IN CHINA - RTX14FM7

Beijing : China’s Wuhan Iron and Steel has planned to shed up to 50,000 jobs, said its chairman Ma Guoqiang, as the country struggles to reduce over capacity with its sluggish economy.

Ma’s comments are a stark illustration of the challenges the world’s second largest economy faces as it seeks to retool it.

“Probably 40,000-50,000 people will have to find other ways forward,” he told people.com.cn, a news portal run by the Communist Party’s mouthpiece the People’s Daily, according to a transcript on the website reports the Dawn.

The firm’s steel division currently has 80,000 employees but might retain only 30,000 of them, said Ma on the sidelines of the National People’s Congress, the country’s rubber-stamp parliament.

China’s economy last year grew at its slowest pace in the century and the outlook remains bleak.

The government lowered its 2016 growth target to 6.5-7 per cent, down from about seven percent, last week. (ANI)